Thursday, June 13, 2013

The Long and Winding Road

A quick dissertation today on an old war-horse of a compositional convention that has been tried and true and around for a long, long time . . . that long and winding road! Relying on a strong use of perspective and focusing on depicting distance, the old idea of painting/drawing a road or path disappearing off into the distance, sometimes mated with a nice fence line or row of buildings or trees, never grows old.

When handled as sublimely as in the accompanying images from the likes of Corot, Van Gogh, Monet, Sisley, Cezanne or any of the others who have made use of this convention over the decades, there is no cliche or lack of viewer interest involved.

With so many variations possible within the context of this simple format, I would imagine that at one time or another, every artist has tried their hand at coming up with their version of the long and winding road at least once, if not over and over again like Monet and several of the others shown here.

With that, here is my latest version of making use of this old standby compositional idea, 'Country Lane, Autumn', completed a half hour ago. The image is 9" x 9.5" and is another work earmarked for a special invitational show this October.

We all travel our own road everyday. Some roads have bumps, stop signs or cross roads. You can create on paper any road you choose. You get to live your road. Your work is always masterful. Roads might be the next project, Terry. Madison County Covered Bridge?

About Me

I am an artist working in the medium of graphite, portraying what I see in the world around me in shades of black, white and grey. After spending many years wearing many different hats and working in many different fields, I have been a professional artist since 1990.